The US Justice Department won’t seek the death penalty for a Colombo crime family consigliere accused of sanctioning the 1997 murder of NYPD Officer Officer Ralph Dols.

US Attorney General Eric Holder issued the course-reversing directive — made public today — without citing a rationale for his shift.

Now Colombo wiseguy Joel “Joe Waverly” Cacace, 72, will face a maximum penalty of life in prison if he’s convicted at his upcoming mob murder trial in Brooklyn federal court.

Cacace is already serving a 20-year sentence for other mob crimes that has him scheduled to be released in June 2020, according to prison records.

Back in Feb. 2011, Holder authorized Brooklyn prosecutors to pursue the death penalty for Cacace, who’s charged with ordering the carefully planned Aug. 25, 1997 hit on the off-duty officer in Brooklyn.

Investigators believe that Cacace sanctioned the murder because he was angry that Dols had married the mobster’s ex-wife, Kim Kennaugh.

Last May, a jury at another Brooklyn federal court mob trial cleared Colombo crime family street boss Thomas “Tommy Shots” Gioeli and soldier Dino “Little Dino” Saracino of participating in the murder of Dols, but convicted them of conspiring to commit other mob murders.